On Saturday morning, bell tolls and names of fallen first responders rang out from Werner Park.
An estimated 200 people participated in the 2019 Nebraska 9/11 Memorial Stair Climb, said organizer Matt Gibbons, a captain in Offutt Fire & Rescue.
The $6,585 raised by the event’s 165 donors will go to the National Fallen Firefighters Foundation to support the families of the 343 firefighters killed in the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks.
Each climber chose a badge depicting a firefighter or police officer who died on 9/11. Then they climbed stairs or walked laps to emulate the World Trade Center’s 110 flights of stairs.
Upon finishing, they rang a bell and read the name of the first responder they represented. Gibbons said it made it a little more real.